I have owned a Timeshare in New Orleans for over 10 years and love the experience. My timeshare was recently purchased by Wyndham Resorts. April last year I was staying at my resort when I was contacted by a representative at the timeshare asking to speak with me about my stay. The representative told me they had interested in buying back my timeshare from me and just needed some information to process to see if I qualified to have them purchase it. After 3 hours they came back and stated that I did qualify and needed to sign some forms before the transaction could take place. One of the forms was a credit application and was told it was standard procedure to check my credit. After I refused to sign the application the "salesman" now called in his boss and I was doubled teamed to sell my timeshare back to them. What was actually happening was they were buying mine back for $15, 000 but transferring me to a point system at another resort in New Orleans for an additional $28, 000. After refusing this offer they brought in a third gentleman to sell me their Discovery Vacation plan worth 308, 000 points for $2500. I could use these points to stay in hotels, fly and best of all, try the new resort in New Orleans to see if I liked it. It was a trial period and if I really liked it (as they assured me I would) I could transfer the $2500 towards the purchase price of the new resort. I purchased the plan. Now the problems started.

After purchasing the plan, I called in November 2008 to book a room at the La Belle Maison in New Orleans. I was told by the rep that the La Belle Maison was booked through August of 2009. My points expire in October of 2009. She told me I could stay at the Avenue Plaza (which is my timeshare) anytime in 2009. I explained the reason I bought this was to stay at this new resort as a "trial" before purchasing. Considering it a loss I told her I would just like to use the points then to buy plane tickets and reserve a hotel room in New Orleans. To my surprise the points are not good for airline tickets and hotels..only if I purchase the plan the originally proposed which was my timeshare plus $28, 000. Fed up with this whole thing I told her just to book me at the La Belle Maison in September 2009. The only availability they had then was over Labor Day weekend. Great I'll take it. Grand Total 121, 000 points for 4 nights which equals about $245 a night to stay there. If anyone travels to New Orleans often, which I do, you know you can get a 4 star hotel in the French Quarter for $120-$150. This program is way oversold and a complete ripoff. I guarantee that as a timeshare owner at Avenue Plaza, these people better not even have the nerve to contact me when I am vacationing down there. I'm still getting vacation time with my $2500, but I feel sorry for the poor saps that get sucked into a lifelong debt of $28, 000. My advice...stay away from these snake oil salesmen.